David Freeman Music

In the midst of all the travel, I forgot to mention that Yacht Rock released an album of new material on Friday , plus a silly video for one of the songs! Check it out.

Yacht Rock spent last weekend in Colorado, playing a couple of high altitude shows. I love this place. Colorado might just be the best state in the country. But first... Thursday night, I played with the Atlanta Latin Jazz Orchestra at Venkman's. Not my best playing! I came up short in preparation, and it bit me in the butt. Several of those charts are much too difficult to sightread (or play after working through them the night before, as I attempted). Add to that a pretty lame solo, and, yeah...I was kind of disappointed in myself. Friday: We came in to Denver through what was probably thirty minutes of consecutive turbulence. Monkeyboy almost broke the armrests off his seat. I slept through most of it (though I had a dream that I was flying, but I was in a closet inside the plane, and the only other guy in the closet was eating potato chips and trying not to throw up). Anyway, the Colorado sky. Beautiful. Our show was at the Mission Ballroom, a relatively new place ...

I'm late with the blog, so this one will be quick! Thursday: I played a gig in Columbus, GA with friends (Rob Opitz, Marla Feeney, Wes Funderburk, Tyrone Jackson, Billy Thornton, and John David) at a meeting of Georgia Science Teachers. It was supposed to be a Mardi Gras theme with possibly 1,000 people in attendance, but it ended up being about 100 people drinking and sitting across the room from us. Very little to suggest Mardi Gras. For our part, Rob had a couple of books of Dixieland arrangements that were really fun to read, so we played these and a few funky/second line jazz tunes for two hours. Not a bad way to spend an evening! Friday: Yacht Rock flew to south Florida to join up on the Sail Across the Sun cruise, traveling from Miami to the Bahamas. We had three shows over four days. The rest of the time was spent watching the other bands, sleeping, eating, or running on the treadmill. Night one looked like this on the pool deck. Not bad, though I...

The tour continues! This past weekend, Yacht Rock was in Florida for a few shows. This is the perfect time of year to be down there, because the heat will return in a matter of a few weeks. Thursday: We left dreary, rainy Atlanta after being delayed for a couple of hours... ...and landed in sunny Tampa! This evening's weather outlook was imperfect at best. The line of storms that had crashed through Georgia was still getting dragged out of the Gulf of Mexico. To try and fit it all in, the start time for our show was moved from 9 to 8:30 PM. Pretty nice gig, though! I think some people stayed away because of the threat of a rain, but it was still decent crowd, and the breeze from the oncoming storm was kind of pleasant. We played alright--it took a while for everybody to relax and settle in, but for the most part, the night moved along quickly. Immediately after the gig, I looked at my phone. Hmmm, tornado warning...is the warning the bad one, or is it a...

Here's a transcription I just finished of Michael Brecker's solos on For David from  The Lady Wants to Be a Star (Martee Lebous, 1976). When else are you going to hear a diminished whole tone scale in a pop song? This whole thing is great. It's largely major pentatonic, and it's slippery, but precise...his time feel really makes this an exceptional moment in a forgettable 70s pop song.

Tuesday: Yacht Rock played a live session at Paste Magazine in downtown Atlanta. It's more record promo stuff.  I finally feel like I'm getting a good handle on the originals, and all the stuff I've worked on is gelling into a cohesive part that makes sense in my head now. In short, I am finally getting it right. FINALLY! Jeez! Anyway, here's the show. Nice mix by Kip. Friday: Remember how last week I flew home and went straight to a rehearsal for The Color Purple ? The dress rehearsal was tonight, and it went pretty well. The vocalists are fantastic! We're giving a concert performance only, so there's no staging, but dang...the actors are killing it. There were a few things, though. First, the Roswell Performing Arts Center is about 60 degrees on stage, which is a little cold, especially sitting in a chair and not moving for a few hours. It also makes tuning a challenge. Second, the audio crew had a lot of trouble getting the three monitors fo...